Method for recording data on optical recording medium

ABSTRACT

A method for recording data on an optical recording medium includes the step of receiving data to be written and control data. The control data includes status information to indicate whether or not an other sector within a block in which a sector is included is valid. The data is written in an other sector within the block. The method further includes determining whether to perform an error certification process based on the control data, and writing the data based on the result of determining step.

This application is a continuation of application Ser. No. 09/707,942,filed on Nov. 8, 2000 now U.S. Pat. No. 6,449,471, the entire contentsof which are hereby incorporated by reference and for which priority isclaimed under 35 U.S.C. § 120; and this application claims priority ofapplication Ser. No. P1999-50890 filed in Korea on Nov. 16, 1999 under35 U.S.C. § 119.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

The present invention relates to a rewritable optical recording mediumsystem, and more particularly, to device and method for recording dataon a rewritable optical recording medium.

2. Background of the Related Art

In general, there are rewritable compact disc(CD-RW) and rewritabledigital versatile disc(DVD−RW, DVD-RAM, DVD+RW) in optical recordingmediums, particularly, in optical disks, which are rewritable freely andrepetitively. In those rewritable optical disks, informationwriting/reading thereto/therefrom are made repetitively as the nature ofuse of the optical disk is. The repetitive write/read of informationcauses a change of a mixing ratio of a recording layer mixture providedfor recording the information from an initial mixing ratio, which leadsto lose initial properties of the mixture, that causes an error occurredin writing/reading information, which is called degradation. Areas ofthe degradation are turned up as defective areas when formatting, orwrite or read command for the optical disk is carried out. Other thanthe degradation, defective areas on the rewritable optical disk arecaused by scratch on a surface, dusts, and/or from production defects.Therefore, in order to prevent writing/reading data to/from thedefective areas formed by the foregoing causes, management of thedefective areas is required. To do this, as shown in FIG. 1, DMAs(DefectManagement Areas) are provided in lead-in areas and in lead-out areas ofthe optical recording medium for managing the defective areas on theoptical recording medium. And, data areas are managed in zones, eachhaving a user area for use in actual writing of data and a spare areafor use in a case of defect occurrence in the user area. Oralternatively, the spare area may be assigned to a portion of the dataarea, i.e., to top or bottom. In general, there are four DMAs providedin one disk(for example, a DVD-RAM), two in the lead-in area and theother two in the lead-out area. As management of the DMAs are important,the same data is repeatedly written in the four DMAs for protection ofdata. Each DMA has two blocks having 32 sectors in total, i.e., oneblock has 16 sectors. A first block of each DMA(called as DDS/PDL block)includes a DDS(Disk Definition Structure) and a PDL(Primary DefectList), and a second block(called as SDL block) of each DMA includes anSDL(Secondary Defect List). The PDL is a primary defective data storageportion and the SDL is a secondary defective data storage portion. Ingeneral, the PDL is in storage of entries of defects occurred in a diskfabrication process and all defective sectors identified in formatting,i.e., initializing and re-initializing, of the disk. Each entry has anentry type and a sector number corresponding to a defective sector. Onthe other hand, the SDL, listed in block units, is in storage of entriesof defective areas occurred after the formatting, or defective areaswhich can not be stored in the PDL during the formatting. Each SDL entryhas one area in storage of a sector number of a first sector in a blockhaving a defective sector occurred therein and the other area in storageof a sector number of a first sector in a spare block which will replacethe defective block. The defective areas(i.e., defective sectors ordefective blocks) in the data area are replaced with good areas,according to a slipping replacement algorithm or linear replacementalgorithm.

Referring to FIG. 2A, in the slipping replacement which is applicable toa case when a defective area is listed on the PDL, if the defectivesector listed on the PDL is present in the user area on which an actualdata is to be written, the defective sector is skipped, and instead, thedefective sector is replaced with a good sector next to the defectivesector in writing a data. Consequently, the user area on which the datais being written is pushed backward, to occupy the spare area as much asthe skipped defective sector, at the end.

And, referring to FIG. 2B, in the linear replacement which is applicableto a case when a defective area is listed on the SDL, if there is adefective block listed on the SDL present in the user area or in thespare area, the defective block is replaced with block units ofreplacement areas assigned to the spare area in writing the data. Inthis instance, though a PSN(Physical Sector Number) assigned to thedefective block is not changed, an LSN(Logical Sector Number) istransferred to the replacement block, together with the data. Thislinear replacement is effective in non-realtime writing/reading a data.

FIG. 3 illustrates a block diagram showing one example of a related artrewritable optical recording disk recording/reproduction device,provided with an optical disk 301, an optical pickup 302, a RF and servoerror generating part 303, a data processing part 304, an interface 305,a servo controller 306, a focus servo driver 307, a tracking servodriver 308, and a microcomputer 309 for controlling the abovecomponents. There is a host 100 connected to the interface 305 of theoptical disk recording/reproducing medium for exchange of commands anddata. In this instance, the host 100, one of PC(Personal Computer),supports the optical disk recording/reproducing device.

A signal track of the foregoing optical disk 301 in FIG. 3 has a landand a groove, wherein data can be recorded/reproduce, not only on theland or in the groove, but also on both of the land and the groove. Inthis instance, under the control of the servo controller 306, theoptical pick up directs an optical beam focused by an objective lens tothe signal track of the optical disk 301, and an optical beam reflectedat a signal recording surface to an optical detector(not shown) fordetecting a focus error and a tracking error after focusing the opticalbeam to the objective lens, again. The optical detector has a pluralityof optical detecting elements, each for providing an electric signalproportional to an amount of light incident thereto to the RF and servoerror generating part 303, which combines the electric signals toproduce a RF signal required for reproduction of a data, and a trackingerror signal TE and a focus error signal FE, both required for servocontrol, and the like. The RF signal is provided to the data processingpart 304 for reproduction, and servo error signals, such as FE and TE,are provided to the servo controller 306. The data processing part 304encodes a data to be written into a recording pulses required by theoptical disk 301 and provides to the optical pickup 302, or restores theRF signal into an original data. The servo controller 306 processes thefocus error signal FE to provide a driving signal to the focus servodriver 307, and processes the tracking error signal TE to provide adriving signal to the tracking servo driver 308 for tracking control.The focus servo driver 307 drives a focus actuator in the optical pickupto move the optical pickup in up and down directions, for following upthe optical disk as the optical disk turns. The tracking servo driver308. The tracking servo driver 308 drives a tracking actuator in theoptical pickup 302 to move the optical pickup 302 in a radial direction,for correcting a position of the beam, to follow up a required track. Inthe meantime, the host 100 transfers recording/reproduction command tothe microcomputer 309 through the interface 305, data to be written tothe data processing part 304, and receives a reproduced data. Themicrocomputer 309 controls the data processing part 304, the interface305 and the servo controller 306 in response to the write/read commandfrom the host. That is, provided that a data to be written is present,the host 100 transfers the data to be written to the optical diskrecording/reproducing device, together with a write command. The data tobe written may be an A/V data(for example, a movie and the like)requiring a real time recording, or a PC data(for example, a controldata or a document file)requiring no real time recording.

FIG. 4 illustrates an example of a related art write command format. Thedata to be written of being the PC data or the A/V data may be informedto the optical disk recording/reproducing device either by using a writecommand, or by means of a separate agreement between the host and theoptical disk recording/reproducing device. In this instance, the A/Vdata is written in block units, and the PC data is written in blockunits or in sector units, which is designated in the write command. Theoptical disk recording/reproducing device writes the data through aRMW(Read-Modify-Write) process if the data to be written is the PC datain sector units, without fail. That is, a block in which a sector the PCdata is to be written therein is read, to check an error, for writingthe data in the sector if there is no error in the sector, or after theerror is corrected if the error can be corrected. The error correctionis carried out in block units. If there is an error in the block, butimpossible to correct, or the block is not read at all, no data iswritten in the block. That is, the data writing is failed. In thisinstance, after making an error report to the host 100, the optical diskrecording/reproducing device writes the data again through the aboveprocess after receiving another area assigned by the host 110, or makesa linear replacement to the spare area. On the other hand, the opticaldisk recording/reproducing device writes the data with, or without theRMW process, i.e., without verification, if the data to be written isthe PC data in block units. In this instance, the optical diskrecording/reproducing device writes no data in areas with defects byusing the PDL and the SDL, which is information indicating defectiveareas on the optical disk. That is, physical sectors recorded on the PDLare skipped in the writing, and physical blocks recorded on the SDL arereplaced with replacement blocks assigned to the spare area in writing.The optical disk recording/reproducing device writes the data in theassigned block directly without the RMW process, if the data to bewritten is the A/V data. Therefore, the data is written in a defectivesector included in the assigned block as it is. That is, in thisinstance too, though the physical sectors recorded on the PDL areskipped in the writing, the physical blocks registered on the SDL areeither skipped or have data written thereon as they are. And, though notregistered on the SDL, a block having an error in a PID(PhysicalIdentification) which indicates a sector address is taken as a defectiveblock and registers on the SDL, either to skip the block or have datawritten thereon.

In the meantime, when it is intended to rewrite a PC data on aparticular sector in a block having a data written therein directlywithout the RMW process, the particular sector is subjected to the RMWprocess, which increases a probability of occurrence of a writingfailure of the PC data, particularly, when the PC data is to be writtenin a particular sector in a block having an A/V data written thereon.And, an error processing, such as this data writing failure, causes acase no data is written on a sector in which a data is required to bewritten.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Accordingly, the present invention is directed to device and method forrecording data on an optical recording medium that substantiallyobviates one or more of the problems due to limitations anddisadvantages of the related art.

An object of the present invention is to provide device and method forrecording data on an optical recording medium, which can reduce datawriting failures.

Additional features and advantages of the invention will be set forth inthe description which follows, and in part will be apparent from thedescription, or may be learned by practice of the invention. Theobjectives and other advantages of the invention will be realized andattained by the structure particularly pointed out in the writtendescription and claims hereof as well as the appended drawings.

To achieve these and other advantages and in accordance with the purposeof the present invention, as embodied and broadly described, the methodfor recording a data on an optical recording medium includes the stepsof (a) if a data to be written in sector units is produced, determininga validity of a data in a block having the sector included therein, andmarking, and transmitting a result of the determination as anidentification information in a control signal, and (b) identifying theidentification information in a control signal transmitted in the step(a), and directly writing the data in the sector of the opticalrecording medium designated by the control signal if the markingindicates that the data in the block of the sector having the data to bewritten is not valid.

The control signal transmitted in the step (a) is a write command,wherein an unused area of the write command has an area foridentification information assigned thereto, the area for identificationinformation having a mark indicating a validity of the data in a blockof the sector the data is to be written therein.

The writing step further includes the step of padding ‘0’ on the rest ofsectors except for a sector in the block the data is to be writtentherein if the identification information in the transmitted controlsignal indicates that the data in the block having the sector the datais to be written therein is not valid.

The writing step further includes the step of padding ‘0’ on rest ofsectors except a sector in the block the data is to be written thereinif the identification information in the transmitted control signalindicates that the data in the block having the sector the data is to bewritten therein is not valid.

The writing step further includes the step of writing the data in thesector through a RMW process if the identification information in thetransmitted control signal indicates that the data in the block havingthe sector the data is to be written therein is valid.

In another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a devicefor recording a data on an optical recording medium including acontroller for transmitting a data to be written, if the data to bewritten is produced, together with a control signal, determining that adata in a block of the sector the data to be written is valid if thedata to be written is a sector unit data, marking a result of thedetermination as identification information in the control signal, andtransmitting the identification information, and a data writing part foridentifying the identification information in the control signal fromthe controller, and writing the data from the controller in the sectordesignated by the control signal directly, if the identificationinformation indicates that the data in the block having the sector thedata to be written therein is not valid.

The control signal from the controller is a write command, wherein anunused area of the write command has an area for identificationinformation assigned thereto, the area for identification informationhaving a mark indicating a validity of the data in a block of the sectorthe data is to be written therein.

The controller determines a validity of the data in the block having thesector the data is to be written therein by using a file system formanaging file information.

If the data in the block having the sector the data to be writtentherein is a real time data of which writing/reading is carried out inblock units, the controller determines that the data in the block is notvalid.

The data writing part pads ‘0’ on rest of sectors except the sector inthe block the data is to be written therein if the identificationinformation in the transmitted control signal indicates that the data inthe block having the sector the data is to be written therein is notvalid.

The data writing part writes the data in the sector through a RMWprocess if the identification information in the transmitted controlsignal indicates that the data in the block having the sector the datais to be written therein is valid.

Thus, according to the device and method for recording data on arewritable optical recording medium of the present invention, in a casea data is required to be written in sector units, the host determines ifdata in other sectors in a block of the sector is valid, and transmits aresult of the determination marked as an identification information in awrite command. Then, the optical disk recording/reproducing deviceidentifies the identification information in the write command, to writethe data from the host in the sector without condition without passingthrough a RMW process if it is marked that the data in other sectors inthe block of the sector having the data to be written therein is notvalid, or to write the data from the host in the sector passing througha RMW process if it is marked that the data in other sectors in theblock of the sector having the data to be written therein is valid.Therefore, the failure of data writing caused by reading failure of datain other sectors in a block of the sector the data is to be writtentherein can be reduced and a system performance can be enhanced.

It is to be understood that both the foregoing general description andthe following detailed description are exemplary and explanatory and areintended to provide further explanation of the invention as claimed.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The accompanying drawings, which are included to provide a furtherunderstanding of the invention and are incorporated in and constitute apart of this specification, illustrate embodiments of the invention andtogether with the description serve to explain the principles of theinvention:

In the drawings:

FIG. 1 illustrates an architecture of a related art optical disk;

FIG. 2A illustrates a related art slipping replacement;

FIG. 2B illustrates a related art linear replacement;

FIG. 3 illustrates a block diagram showing one example of a related artoptical disk recording/reproducing device;

FIG. 4 illustrates an example of a related art write command format;

FIG. 5 illustrates an example of a write command format in accordancewith a preferred embodiment of the present invention; and,

FIG. 6 illustrates a flow chart showing the steps of a method forwriting a data on an optical recording/reproducing device in accordancewith a preferred embodiment of the present invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT

Reference will now be made in detail to the preferred embodiments of thepresent invention, examples of which are illustrated in the accompanyingdrawings. FIG. 5 illustrates modification of a portion of an existingwrite command to be transmitted from a host for data writing accordingto the present invention. For keeping interchangeability with anexisting write command system, a flag is provided to the existing writecommand system for identification, which is called as FDR(Force DataRecord) flag in the present invention for convenience of explanation.The FDR flag is provided to a reserved area of the write command, forexample, to a first bit of a first byte in FIG. 5. FIG. 5 illustratesonly one example, and it does not matter if it is any reserved areawithin the write command. That is, if the data is to be written insector units, the host 100 marks validity of data in other sectors inthe same block having the above sector included thereto on the FDR flagin transmission of the write command.

FIG. 6 illustrates a flow chart showing the steps of a method forwriting a data on an optical recording/reproducing device in accordancewith a preferred embodiment of the present invention.

Upon occurrence of data to be written in sector units(step 601), thehost 100 determines validity of data in other sectors of the blockhaving the data to be written(step 602). The validity of the data can bedetermined in a variety of methods, and in the present invention, forexample, the file system is employed for determining the validity of thedata. That is, presence of data in the sector can be determined withreference to a spare bit map of the file system. For example, if a sparebit of the sector is ‘0’, it represents that there is no data recordedin the sector, and if a spare bit of the sector is ‘1’, it representsthat there is a data recorded in the sector. If a file is erased, a filesystem is marked that there is no data in the file though there is dataactually. That is, when the file is erased, the file system changessectors which indicates that there is a data recorded in the file from‘1’ to ‘0’. In this instance, the block having a sector a new data is tobe written therein may, or may not have a data already written which maybe a PC data or an A/V data. If the data written already therein is thePC data, though only the new data may be written in sector units, sincethe necessity for maintaining of the already written data is strong, thenew data may be written in the sector while the already written data isencoded in block units maintaining the already written data in the blockas it is. However, because the A/V data is written/read by block units,the A/V data and the PC data can not be mixed in one block. Therefore,in order to write the PC data in a particular sector in a block havingthe A/V data written therein, the A/V data written already in the sameblock is required to be determined as being invalid. In this instance,the file system may be marked that all the sectors in the block havingthe A/V data written therein have no data written therein. Thus, when itis intended to write the data in sector units, the host 100 may know ordetermine a validity of the data in other sectors in that block by usingthe file system for itself. That is, once the host 100 knows that thedata already written in the block of the sector a data to be writtentherein is the A/V data, the host 100 can determine that the data in theblock is not valid even if the file system is not referred to. Once adata in other sector in the block of the sector the data to be writtentherein is determined to be valid according to the foregoing process,the FDR flag is reset to ‘0’ to provide the write command.(step 603).And, once the data in other sector in the block of the sector the datato be written therein is determined to be invalid according to theforegoing process, the FDR flag is set to ‘1’ to provide the writecommand.(step 604).

On the other hand, the optical disk recording/reproducing devicereceives the write command from the host 100(step 605), and determinesthe FDR flag of being set to ‘1’ (step 606). If it is determined in thestep 606 that the FDR flag is set to ‘1’, ‘0’ is padded on other sectorsin the block of the sector a data designated by the write command is tobe written therein(step 607). Then, a padded value and the data of thesector in which the data is to be written are ECC encoded and written inblock units(step 608). As a result, a desired data can be written in thesector designated by the write command without the RMW process. That is,if the FDR flag is set to ‘1’, it means that the data is forced towritten regardless of defect. Therefore, if the FDR flag is set to ‘1’,no error report is provided to the host. If the FDR flag is thus set to‘1’, taking that ‘0’ is written in other sectors in the block of thesector, no data in the block is read, but a data from the host is onlywritten in the sector by ECC encoding. Processing thereafter is made tobe done by the optical disk recording/reproducing device for itself. Asan example, after the data is written in the sector according to theforegoing process, if a block of the sector is read to find no error orthe error is corrected, if the error can be corrected, and if the blockis not read, or the error can not be corrected, the linear replacementor the like can be carried out.

In the meantime, if it is determined in the step 606 that the FDR flagis set to ‘0’, the data is written through the RMW process the same asin the related art. That is, since the data in the block of the sectoris valid, as padding of ‘0’ or the like should be avoided, the data inthe block is read at first, and presence of defect of the block isdetermined(step 609). If the data in the block is not read, the data isdetermined to be defective, and an error correction possibility ischecked(step 610). In this instance, if it is determined in the step 610that, through there is an error in the data, the error can be corrected,the error is corrected(step 613) and the data is written in the sectordesignated by the write command(step 614). And, if it is determined inthe step 609 that there is no defect in the data, in this instance too,the data is written in the sector designated by the write command(step614). On the other hand, if it is determined in the step 610 that thecorrection of error is not possible, the data writing in the sector isfailed. In this instance, an error report is provided to the host100(step 611). Then, either the data is written again in an areadesignated by the host 100 newly through the foregoing process, or alinear replacement to the spare area is carried out(step 612).

Thus, the device and method for recording data on a rewritable opticalrecording medium of the present invention can be applied to a case whena data is required to be written in sector unit regardless that either aPC data or an A/V data is written in a block of the sector.Particularly, the device and method for recording data on a rewritableoptical recording medium of the present invention is effective to a casethe PC data is written in a particular sector in a block having the A/Vdata already written therein.

As has been explained, according to the device and method for recordingdata on a rewritable optical recording medium of the present invention,in a case a data is required to be written in sector units, the hostdetermines if data in other sectors in a block of the sector is valid,and transmits a result of the determination marked as an identificationinformation in a write command. Then, the optical diskrecording/reproducing device identifies the identification informationin the write command, to write the data from the host in the sectorwithout condition without passing through a RMW process if it is markedthat the data in other sectors in the block of the sector having thedata to be written therein is not valid, or to write the data from thehost in the sector passing through a RMW process if it is marked thatthe data in other sectors in the block of the sector having the data tobe written therein is valid. Therefore, the failure of data writingcaused by reading failure of data in other sectors in a block of thesector the data to be written therein can be reduced and a systemperformance can be enhanced.

It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that variousmodifications and variations can be made in the device and method forrecording data on a rewritable optical recording medium of the presentinvention without departing from the spirit or scope of the invention.Thus, it is intended that the present invention cover the modificationsand variations of this invention provided they come within the scope ofthe appended claims and their equivalents.

1. A method for recording data on an optical recording medium,comprising the steps of: (a) receiving new data to be written in one ormore sector within a block and control data, said control data includingstatus information comprising a flag indicating whether or not old datawritten in the block is valid; (b) determining whether the old data isto be preserved based on the flag of the status information in thecontrol data; and (c) writing the new data based on the result of step(b).
 2. The method of claim 1, wherein the writing step writes the newdata without an error certification process if the status informationindicates that the old data is not valid.
 3. The method of claim 2,wherein “0” is padded on another sector in which old data is writtenwithin the block if the status information indicates that the old datais not valid.
 4. The method of claim 1, wherein the writing step writesthe new data and old data with an error certification process if thestatus information indicates that the old data is valid.
 5. The methodof claim 4, wherein the writing step includes the steps of reading thenew data and old data of the block and determining whether the readblock is defective.
 6. The method of claim 5, wherein a possibility ofan error correction is checked when the new data and/or old data is notread.
 7. The method of claim 6, wherein the error correction process isperformed when the read block is not defective or the new data and olddata is possible to correct the error, and the new data and old data arewritten the block designated by a write command.
 8. A method forrecording new data on an optical recording medium, comprising the stepsof: (a) identifying an identification information in a control signalreceived, the identification information comprising a flag identifyingwhether or not old data written in a block having a sector includedtherein is valid; (b) determining whether to preserve the old data inthe sector of the block designated by the control signal depending uponthe flag of the identification; and (c) writing the new data based onthe result of step (b).
 9. A method for recording data on an opticalrecording medium, comprising the steps of: (a) identifying anidentification information in a control signal received, theidentification information to identify whether or not data in a blockhaving a sector included therein is valid; (b) determining whether towrite the data in the sector of the optical recording medium designatedby the control signal depending upon a status of the identificationinformation; and (c) padding “0” on remaining sectors except a sector inthe block in which the data is to be written if the identificationinformation indicates that the data in the block having the sector thedata is to be written therein is not valid.
 10. A method as claimed inclaim 8, further comprising writing the new data and old data in theblock through a RMW (Read-Modify-Write) process if the identificationinformation indicates that the old data in the block is valid.
 11. Amethod as claimed in claim 10, wherein the writing step includes thesteps of: (a) if the identification information in the received controlsignal indicates that the old data in the block is valid, reading thenew data and old data in the block and determining a defect; (b) if thenew data and/or old data is determined defective in the step (a),determining whether an error can be corrected or not, to correct theerror if correction of the error is possible, and writing the new dataand old data in the block designated by the control signal; and (c) ifthe new data and old data are determined to be not defective in the step(a), writing the new data and old data in the block designated by thecontrol signal.
 12. The method of claim 9, wherein the identificationinformation includes a flag that identifies whether or not data in theblock having the sector included therein is valid such that thedetermining step is performed depending on the flag of theidentification information.